Smany “Polyphenic” (Bunkai-kei records) Last year, netlabel Bunkai-Kei records made a big deal about singer Smany’s debut album “komoriuta.” It released a video trailer for it, along with calling up some of the more prominent names in Japan’s online-music scene to remix songs from ...

It was a bit of good timing for Tony Miller when two underground music scenes he liked intersected in 2011. “I was becoming increasingly interested in the U.K.’s pirate radio scene, and I thought I could use my Web engineering skills to make something ...

Netlabel culture in Japan — referring to Web-only music labels that distribute tunes online, usually for free — has been around long enough to develop its own set of minor celebrities and “star” imprints. Bunkai-Kei has become one of the most popular of these ...